Was hoping to do a variety of styles. The chimney has a damper on it. How does the rear chimney design affect the pizza making process?

You don't get proper convection with a rear chimney. You have a steady flow of cold air in the front and hot air out the back. It will be difficult enough to get sufficient top heat with that oven design without cold air blowing across the top of your pizza. If you close the damper, you will just have an oven without a chimney; It might work for bread or roast beef, but not pizza.

I think you will find that this oven, at best, will bake the same pizza as you could bake in your home oven with a pizza stone. I think it will be very difficult to balance the heat at temperatures north of 300C, and if you run it hotter - trying for Neapolitan or even 4ish minute NY - you will end up with pizza that is scorched in some places and underdone in others.

I have not used the oven, and this is simply an educated guess. Notwithstanding, there is a reason why there are exactly zero professional wood fired pizza ovens with this design.

Take your time looking for a WFO and get it right or you will hate it every time you go to use it - if you keep using it. There are a lot of people building WFOs who don't have a clue how to design a good oven for pizza. I never would have guessed how many different companies are making WFOs but for the surprising regularity someone comes here like you did and asks about another oven nobody has ever heard of.

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"We make great pizza, with sourdough when we can, commercial yeast when we must, but always great pizza." Craig's Neapolitan Garage

Ahh. I understand. One more question about this oven before we total nix it. The oven does have louvers on the front door. Would there be a way to combine the chimney damper and the louvers simultaneously to create a proper heating environment? We really appreciate your help to this point.

Ahh. I understand. One more question about this oven before we total nix it. The oven does have louvers on the front door. Would there be a way to combine the chimney damper and the louvers simultaneously to create a proper heating environment? We really appreciate your help to this point.

I think the louvers in the front door are intended to be used along with the damper to regulate the temperature in the oven via limiting oxygen to the fire - much like you would find in a smoker or pit bbq. This is fine for maintaining roasting temperatures (250-350F), but I don't see how they could be used for baking pizza where higher temps are the goal.

CL

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"We make great pizza, with sourdough when we can, commercial yeast when we must, but always great pizza." Craig's Neapolitan Garage

I contacted the he Portugal company, Impexfire and asked why they installed a rear chimney and the sent me back a very interesting drawing of the guts of this wood oven. It seems they have a false roof up in there that not only lowers the ceiling height but circulates the hot air back over the pizza to the interior front vent (not chimney) until it finds its way back to the rear chimney. This seems like a very unique solution because not only does it force the heated air back over the top of the pizza but the air is not allowed to cool until it goes back to the rear chimney on the next layer up.

I contacted the he Portugal company, Impexfire and asked why they installed a rear chimney and the sent me back a very interesting drawing of the guts of this wood oven.

But, if it is built as drawn, wouldn't that be the same as having an oven with a door the same height as the oven opening? The hottest air would certainly flow out the chimney, rather than have any remain in the oven chamber. It would be more interesting if they had the internal ceiling drop down to door height before it hit the chimney.

The other question would be how this would interact with the heat loading of the ceiling. Typically, you have the dome mass of a specific thickness surrounded by inactive insulation. In the drawing, you would have circulating air that would be hot, but could also be taking heat away from the dome mass because of the air flow.

well this is a metal pizza oven so it has low dome mass potential, i think what they are trying to accomplish in non radiant materials looks like a hell of an effort, not sure why they went through all this effort though, if they had left the chimney in the front they could probably of reduced there manufacturing costs significantly, there must be a reason they went through all this effort, hopefully by building a better mouse trap they will be succeeding in the art of pizza making..this oven is attractive to buyers who need a small foot print and prefer a quick warm up and a quick cool down.

We did go ahead with the purchase, we needed an oven that is small and will heat up and cool down fast, will burn wood inside the oven and not under it for that smoke taste, also will let us smoke foods, ribs turkeys etc, the interior design offers the proper airflow and a hi temp environment.....we'll be setting it up mid May and will keep you posted.

We are starting to break in The Maximus. Being our first wood burning oven we have a considerable learning curve: building the fire, stoking the fire, venting the fire etc. We are hoping to hit the high temperatures needed for Neapolitan but its probably not likely due to the lack of thermal mass with stainless steel. As far as the oven itself its well made and extremely heavy for being portable. Here are some pics in action and will post some pizza pics as soon as we're no longer embarrassed to share them. Will update this post over the summer. Have a great summer.

Thermal mass aids heat retention and re- radiation, you can hit high temps by the strength of a sustained fire alone. It will be less able to retain heat as long as a masonry oven but you do not need that condition unless you are catering regularly on a commercial basis. Hope your bakes go well, check out the Forno a legna videos, they sure show what these ovens can do.

Thermal mass aids heat retention and re- radiation, you can hit high temps by the strength of a sustained fire alone. It will be less able to retain heat as long as a masonry oven but you do not need that condition unless you are catering regularly on a commercial basis.

Or unless you want balanced heat...

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"We make great pizza, with sourdough when we can, commercial yeast when we must, but always great pizza." Craig's Neapolitan Garage

Thermal mass does not guarantee balanced heat or temperature conditions, in an oven that is a consequence of how the surface is heated, where the heat source is, its intensity, and the convection patterns within. Thermal mass has some influence on the capabilities of the surface but little influence on convection, and none on where you choose to locate the fire and how intense you want it to be.

Thermal mass does not guarantee balanced heat or temperature conditions, in an oven that is a consequence of how the surface is heated, where the heat source is, its intensity, and the convection patterns within. Thermal mass has some influence on the capabilities of the surface but little influence on convection, and none on where you choose to locate the fire and how intense you want it to be.

Who said anything about a guarantee? Mass plays a major role in heat balance. Insulation can serve much the same function. I'll guarantee you can't have balanced heat without sufficient mass or insulation, AOTBE. The more you rely on the fire to maintain temperature, the less balanced the oven will be. Convection is not the relevant heat transfer mechanism to consider here - it's radiant heat that is the meaningful variable.

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"We make great pizza, with sourdough when we can, commercial yeast when we must, but always great pizza." Craig's Neapolitan Garage

Who said anything about a guarantee? Mass plays a major role in heat balance. Insulation can serve much the same function. I'll guarantee you can't have balanced heat without sufficient mass or insulation, AOTBE. The more you rely on the fire to maintain temperature, the less balanced the oven will be. Convection is not the relevant heat transfer mechanism to consider here - it's radiant heat that is the meaningful variable.

Oh don't make things up. Thermal mass only comes into it if you have a prolonged fire and there has been enough absorption of heat through time for it to re-radiate over time. Not in the the 20 minutes it takes for these oven s to heat the base and have a top heat which moves via convection, and is aided by reflective heat more than it would be with radiant heat. Radiant heat is irrelevant largely with the 304 steel, it is better with mild steel. There are lots of conventional ovens with thermal mass that do not have a desired heat balance, and that desired heat balance is achieved by managing a number of variables. Take a closed room in a stone castle with a large fireplace and the same size room with a small fireplace, you do not get heat balance just because the walls are made of stone and have thermal mass capacity. The same principles apply to an oven, albeit in a smaller and more concentrated situation.

Oh don't make things up. Thermal mass only comes into it if you have a prolonged fire and there has been enough absorption of heat through time for it to re-radiate over time. Not in the the 20 minutes it takes for these oven s to heat the base and have a top heat which moves via convection, and is aided by reflective heat more than it would be with radiant heat. Radiant heat is irrelevant largely with the 304 steel, it is better with mild steel. There are lots of conventional ovens with thermal mass that do not have a desired heat balance, and that desired heat balance is achieved by managing a number of variables. Take a closed room in a stone castle with a large fireplace and the same size room with a small fireplace, you do not get heat balance just because the walls are made of stone and have thermal mass capacity. The same principles apply to an oven, albeit in a smaller and more concentrated situation.

And what exactly did I make up?

If you want to bake at 300C, Iím sure the oven will suit you just fine and (lack of) mass wonít be an issue, but letís be honest, thatís just a glorified conventional oven and not what Iím talking about. Lack of balance is a minor inconvenience with a huge margin of error at low temps like that. Iím talking about pushing up into the 450C+ range where the margin of error is meaningful. The importance of heat balance is not linear with temperature. The IR from the fire needed to hit high temps in that oven will dominate the heat balance or lack thereof.

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"We make great pizza, with sourdough when we can, commercial yeast when we must, but always great pizza." Craig's Neapolitan Garage